“For the world of institutional investing, the topic of our time is none other than fees.” Most of the solutions being touted, such as 1-or-30, are anything but revolutionary. “Any magic is really just sleight-of-hand meant to distract us from realizing how low our expectations are for any meaningful improvement in the existing misaligned fee structures.” We must overcome this built-in bias and “expand the window of possible choices to include those that will be seen as utterly unthinkable by today’s standards.” For example, a “rent” system could be adopted in which “the allocator no longer pays fees to the manager for the use of its own capital and is assured of receiving the investment outcome it seeks (i.e., the negotiated rent). The manager gets the capital and potential revenue it needs to run its business.” Such a revolutionary move would place the risk directly where it belongs: on the asset manager.

“We live in an age judged to be one of exciting technological change, but our national accounts tell us that productivity is almost stagnant. Is the slowdown or the innovation an illusion?” The truth is we don’t yet know and it might be something else. There might be a measurement error or a lag before big gains from AI and other revolutionary technologies kick in.

“This is a revolutionary Budget. It has major, big-ticket announcements which will help India take a giant leap in our aspirations to establish a New India.” Perhaps the most ambitious is a measure to expand health insurance to half a billion people. “With this added health cover benefit, we can be truly proud of being a growing economy with concerns of the marginalized and the disadvantaged being well taken care of. In a way, this is a redistribution of wealth generated in favour of the poor and the impoverished.”

“After a record year for fund raising, large fintech companies are now emerging in marketplace lending and payments, with many more newcomers deploying venture capital money raised in $25 million to $50 million chunks to transform capital markets and traditional banking mainstays such as mortgage lending.” Fintech could prove highly disruptive. “Fintech start-ups are building revolutionary applications for blockchain, attacking every specialist niche in the financial world and keeping the image of fintech clean with business ventures aimed at inclusion.”

“Electric buses in parts of South Korea, Italy, Britain and California are, today, recharging themselves from underground wireless chargers.” Wireless charging isn’t new. Nicholas Tesla used resonant induction in the 19th century, but it may finally prove revolutionary. From mobile phones to cars and kitchen appliances, “sales of such machines, now half a billion dollars a year, will grow 30-fold over the next decade.” Furthermore, the technology may succeed in “decarbonising the world’s road vehicles.”